BlackBerry has (finally) brought its BlackBerry Messenger service - or BBM, as its known - to iOS and Android. Astonishingly, we've been waiting for BBM to turn up on the world's leading mobile operating systems for five long months.

As we know, the Canadian smartphone maker was expected to launch the BBM messaging service on iOS and Android in September. But the cross-platform chat applications were delayed when a leaked version was distributed, effectively upending the company's formal release schedule.

"In the next few hours, people will start seeing BBM in Google Play, the App Store and in select Samsung App Stores – where it will be free to download," BlackBerry confirmed today.

The company says its team of developers and engineers has been working around the clock on this and that "some incredible work has been done."

The only mate of mine who's ex BlackBerry said to me the only thing he would want or misses is BB's email system. BBM has been overtaken by iMessage for him and he never cared about BBM when he had a CrackBerry..

Exactly! I called for this around the release of the 1st gen iphone release. Had they had some sense and foresight, BBM could've EASILY been a huge hit across ALL mobile platforms, even as a paid app. They could've very well had the best head start over all mobile messaging apps.

Oh well. Now the greatest challenge is finding someone with a blackberry.

Im already donlot thiss app since the first roll out… and its been working just fine… my wife is using android… and on android its same with apple… we have to wait for the approvl… but i skip that part by fill the email addres with mine… and change it to bb id that i've been created before for my wife… and its work… without any approval…